FF.Net.... You suck for what you're doing to the authors...
Dear Fanfiction.net,
Now I know why members of LJ tend to avoid you. And it's not because of the horrid grammar or even the spelling, but because of your heavy-handed approach to handling things. This recent purge of fanfiction is a slap to the face and a punch to the gut to the authors who have worked hard on their stories. You don't even give them the time to change whatever parts of the story that you're not happy with.
Yes I know, you've specifically mentioned in the ToS that explicit scenes were not allowed. But to use a BOT to remove fics using a few choice keywords, that's just plain unacceptable and WRONG!! (100,000+ fics since the start of the purge, it can be nothing but a bot.) The bot removes stories at random based on the keywords you've programmed into it! There are authors in the community that don't sign back on for months at a time and even those that have passed away and relatives have logged into their account to tell faithful readers about their passing and that those stories would remain there as part of a tribute to their lives and what they have accomplished. How can you justify removing their stories, their legacy? HOW can you justify not giving the authors a warning!? NOT EVERYONE has a back-up to their stories that they've posted due to a number of reasons (e.g. file corruption, data lost due to the computer failure etc.). And what is your definition of explicit anyway?! Everyone has their own definition and you've left it to the authors to interpret the meaning for TEN years!!!!
I may have only been a member of the community since 2004 but I've been lurking there since 2002! For me its a place where I can go to to cheer myself up when I'm feeling down or to read something, ye gasp!, violent to appease my anger instead of doing something destructive to either myself or my room!
I may not be an author myself (years at uni writing scientific reports have curb my talent for creative writing) but I know how new authors perceive Fanfiction.Net and LiveJournal.com respectively (I'm a member of both). Fanfiction.Net was looked upon as a place where new authors can test the waters and not be afraid to ask for help from other authors (Thank you for the beta reader function. At least you did something right by the site and its authors and I acknowledge that.) and to grow their talent and a place to come back to time and time again even though they may have grown into accomplished writers because this was where they started. To new writers, Livejournal is a place for the experienced writers because, lets face it, most of the stories on LJ are beta read, brit-picked and revised till they shine (yes even some of the anonymous KINK MEMES) AND you need to know all the different communities that you can post and link your stories to, a daunting and insurmountable challenge for the newly initiated author.
It's a huge disappointment and a let down to see a once thriving site for authors to Unleash [their] Imagination reduced to random deletion of stories by bots, authors taking up the fight to stop it and readers afraid to READ anything as it may be gone the next minute, hour or day. In terms of the numbers of imagination taking flight, be it readers or authors, this site is almost at a standstill (good discussions going on in the forum on how to solve this does not really count.... there were mentions of pitch forks).
So all I ask is for you to halt the bots and to listen to your users. Reinstate the MA category if you can. Have US users log in before we can access that rating, and we don't care if you have us type in the captica code and click on the 'I am over 18 and can read this story' button every single time we click on a MA rated story even when we've logged in. Just please stop the deletion! Authors are losing years of work and some of them aren't even alive today to stop their works from disappearing. Think of them and their family. Think of your users and stop deleting our memories.
Semper Enim Imaginaation; For The Imagination. For the imagination that you have lost.
Penname: [blank], a once proud, now deeply concerned member of Fanfiction.net. One voice amongst many.
Now I know why members of LJ tend to avoid you. And it's not because of the horrid grammar or even the spelling, but because of your heavy-handed approach to handling things. This recent purge of fanfiction is a slap to the face and a punch to the gut to the authors who have worked hard on their stories. You don't even give them the time to change whatever parts of the story that you're not happy with.
Yes I know, you've specifically mentioned in the ToS that explicit scenes were not allowed. But to use a BOT to remove fics using a few choice keywords, that's just plain unacceptable and WRONG!! (100,000+ fics since the start of the purge, it can be nothing but a bot.) The bot removes stories at random based on the keywords you've programmed into it! There are authors in the community that don't sign back on for months at a time and even those that have passed away and relatives have logged into their account to tell faithful readers about their passing and that those stories would remain there as part of a tribute to their lives and what they have accomplished. How can you justify removing their stories, their legacy? HOW can you justify not giving the authors a warning!? NOT EVERYONE has a back-up to their stories that they've posted due to a number of reasons (e.g. file corruption, data lost due to the computer failure etc.). And what is your definition of explicit anyway?! Everyone has their own definition and you've left it to the authors to interpret the meaning for TEN years!!!!
I may have only been a member of the community since 2004 but I've been lurking there since 2002! For me its a place where I can go to to cheer myself up when I'm feeling down or to read something, ye gasp!, violent to appease my anger instead of doing something destructive to either myself or my room!
I may not be an author myself (years at uni writing scientific reports have curb my talent for creative writing) but I know how new authors perceive Fanfiction.Net and LiveJournal.com respectively (I'm a member of both). Fanfiction.Net was looked upon as a place where new authors can test the waters and not be afraid to ask for help from other authors (Thank you for the beta reader function. At least you did something right by the site and its authors and I acknowledge that.) and to grow their talent and a place to come back to time and time again even though they may have grown into accomplished writers because this was where they started. To new writers, Livejournal is a place for the experienced writers because, lets face it, most of the stories on LJ are beta read, brit-picked and revised till they shine (yes even some of the anonymous KINK MEMES) AND you need to know all the different communities that you can post and link your stories to, a daunting and insurmountable challenge for the newly initiated author.
It's a huge disappointment and a let down to see a once thriving site for authors to Unleash [their] Imagination reduced to random deletion of stories by bots, authors taking up the fight to stop it and readers afraid to READ anything as it may be gone the next minute, hour or day. In terms of the numbers of imagination taking flight, be it readers or authors, this site is almost at a standstill (good discussions going on in the forum on how to solve this does not really count.... there were mentions of pitch forks).
So all I ask is for you to halt the bots and to listen to your users. Reinstate the MA category if you can. Have US users log in before we can access that rating, and we don't care if you have us type in the captica code and click on the 'I am over 18 and can read this story' button every single time we click on a MA rated story even when we've logged in. Just please stop the deletion! Authors are losing years of work and some of them aren't even alive today to stop their works from disappearing. Think of them and their family. Think of your users and stop deleting our memories.
Semper Enim Imaginaation; For The Imagination. For the imagination that you have lost.
Penname: [blank], a once proud, now deeply concerned member of Fanfiction.net. One voice amongst many.